Mr. & Mrs. Soucey | Country Club of Ocala

Angela & Chandler became husband and wife on May 4th, 2019. It was a gorgeous Florida day with perfect weather for an outdoor wedding at Ocala’s golf and country club. When photographing the groomsmen & Chandler getting ready, he was the sweetest Groom, truly so excited to see his bride and say “I Do” to forever!

Soucey’s, your love story is one that we absolutely adore and wish we could photograph each and every day! Never forget that first sight kinda love that you both share together. It truly is so special! We will let the photographs do the rest of the talking. Thank you for choosing SS to document and help tell the story of your wedding day!

We wish you both nothing but the best!

XOXO,

B+W

The end! Here’s to forever!

What to Wear | Photo Shoot Prep

“but, what do I wear!?” such a commonly asked question, so do not feel alone! as photographers, we are asked this quite often when our clients are preparing for their highly anticipated photo shoot. our response is mostly, whatever you put into your photos is really what you will get out of them. yeah, so kinda like pretty much anything else in life! insert a shoulder shrug!

we’ve compiled a list of our own ideas from experience and what we have learned along the way. we want our clients to look and feel their best, especially when an important time in your life is being photographed and captured forever.

photographers alike want you to absolutely LOVE your photos, but if you aren’t happy with what you look and feel like, let’s be honest, it’s next to near impossible to make a client love their pictures. We are team LOVE yo’ self! Look good, feel good. This is just the cold hard plain truth, y’all.

Here are 7 key points we have thought of to help you in your photo session preparations:

Key #1: think about the style of photographer you are choosing

Us gals over here at Southern Studios love light and bright! So colors matter! Neutrals matter! Say it with us!

We prefer to shoot light colors, as they photograph best with our style of photography. Not necessarily shying away from color, but doing so the right way. If you are booking a moody-edit style photographer, obviously dark colors photograph just fine, and really help create that aesthetic they are going for. If you are truly stuck, don’t hesitate to reach out and ask your photographer what they think is best for where you are shooting and what style you are going for.

Key #2: dress up!

It’s not every day you hire a professional photographer to capture a significant memory in your life. Why not use us as the excuse to buy a new outfit and dress up! Dresses and skirts always, always, always photograph better than pants or shorts. It’s something about how they flow in photographs and how they hit at the leg! Wear that pretty little dress with those high heels, girl! Own that pony tail, work that updo! You get the point.

For men, a dress shirt photographs better than a collared shirt and much better than a t-shirt! Need I say more? We are totally cool with a pair of nicer dressier jeans, but dress pants provide that GQ factor that we really are going for! Go all out! Wanting to wear a blazer or a jacket? Don’t hesitate! Even though, the jacket should probably wait for a session booked in our colder months here in Florida! ;) Here are some examples for men and women alike.

Key #3: Hire a Professional Hair & Makeup Artist:

This is huge and one last thing you should have to worry about when it comes to getting ready for a photo shoot. We have a great list of vendors that we can recommend to you! Professional hair and makeup is just another thing to help you feel and look your best. If you don’t normally wear a lot of makeup and want to remain as close to natural as possible, don’t shy away from discussing this with your makeup artist. They have mad skills to make you look incredible!

Key #4: Dress according to your theme
Sounds self explanatory but we want to give you some examples. This engagement session at the University of Florida is a great one! Imagine how differently their photos would look if they had been wearing red? Or any other color other than a neutral, or the good ole faithful orange and blue (Go Gators!) ;) The jeans and boots went perfectly with the theme of their session, as well. Hello football season in the south!

Key #5: Don’t be afraid to accessorize

We LOVE accessories and other items to make your outfit go from good to great! Even if you (Mom) want to remain neutral, throw a hat, bow, flower crown, head band, head wrap, scarf, vest, etc. on your little ones to dress up your family photos and take them to the next level. Here are some examples for you that we absolutely LOVE!

Key #6: Dress up the bump!

To expand on our 1st key point, we wanted to showcase some examples for maternity photos. It’s not every day you get to photograph this time in your life.

Key # 7: Coordinating vs. Matching

Remember the days when we all wore matching denim jeans and white shirts on the beach for family photos? Or even when we all wore the same color for our studio style portraits at Sears? LOL! Long gone are those days, PRAISE BE!

Say hello to coordination! Limited patterns and a pop of color. Here are some examples of what we love:

BUT, of course, every rule has an exception. Littles, sisters, brothers and even twins in matching outfits is just plain precious. By all means, please do that!

That’s all for now! We hope this helps alleviate some of the stress that comes when trying to plan for photos. We may add to this post in the future as we meet and photograph even more of you beautiful and amazing people! Please do not hesitate to reach out if you are stuck and need additional ideas or help. We just want you to love your photos as much as possible! As always, thank you for supporting SS! We love you guys!

XOXO,

B+W

Black & White Mini's 2019

We really are working on being better about updating this little realm of the internet! It’s amazing to see how far blogs have come in the last 10 years. Crazy how the internet and even life as we know it changes so fast! Anyways, let’s get back to the point of this blog post.

Earlier this year, in April, we photographed some pretty amazing kiddos while we hosted our very first round of Black & White mini’s! We had a dear, faithful client of ours reach out and say how awesome it would be if we could offer these and we thought—why not!

We absolutely LOVE how these portraits came out and we better be doing them by the time I (Whitney) have kids!! ;) I always tease Britt about that!

Black and White images just have something so timeless, classic, and unique about them. These will be beautiful for years to come and they make really great prints up on your walls, too.

Here are a few of our favorites from these sessions, we have model material for clients—seriously!

XOXO,

B+W

Mr. & Mrs. Bostick | Clay Theatre Wedding

On Saturday, June 1st, 2019, Mae + Grant became Mr. & Mrs. Bostick! We feel honored and privileged to have been apart of such a beautiful and special day in their lives. These two are so sweet, inside and out! We wish them both all the happiness in the world as they tackle life together as partners, hand in hand! Mae & Grant, we cannot wait to see what God has in store for you both. We are excited to watch it all unfold and we want to thank you for letting us capture your big day! Everything was absolutely beautiful. No detail left untouched!

Mae + Grant chose to get married at the brand new, Clay Theatre, which is a newly remodeled vintage theatre turned into a gorgeous wedding venue. The Clay Theatre is located in Green Cove Springs, FL. We absolutely loved shooting here and look forward to future events!

Team of Incredible Vendors:

Venue: Clay Theatre

Event Coordination: Lauren Cowgill

Photographer: Southern Studios

Caterer: PJ’s Catering/Jennifer Sureda

Florist: Parker’s Events/Tammy Woodcock

DJ: DJ6Burgh/Dave Gullick

Wooden Cross Rental: Clark’s Event Rentals, LLC

Hair Stylist: Braid Bar of St. Augustine/Lauren Burks

Makeup Artist: Makeup by Christina Burns/Christina Burns

Cake: Ms. Mary’s Cakes/Laura Livingston

XOXO,

B+W

What are Fresh 48 Sessions?

We get a lot of questions about what exactly we offer when it comes to documenting a brand new little baby after birth!

Currently, we offer Fresh 48 sessions and Birth Stories. In this specific blog post, we will be discussing all that happens during a Fresh 48!

To break it down, Fresh 48 sessions occur when the baby is already born and we meet you in the hospital room either as soon as the baby is born or after you’ve had some time to get freshened up. Pretty sure we just heard the sigh of major relief from all you Mama’s out there! Ha!

We leave this option completely up to you. Each preference is different for each set of parents. Think about what you want photographed the most and let us know. All we ask is that we’re updated, typically by text, by either you, a spouse or a family member that is in the know. We travel to Gainesville, Middleburg, Lake City, Ocala, Jacksonville, and more.

We all know that babies change very quickly. . . their tiny noses, ears, skin dimples, wrinkles and little feet all are wayyyy cute enough to be captured forever!

This is one of the best days of your life. Mama, you just gave birth to your new little best friend for life! How amazing is God for creating life and how awesome is it that your body can sustain life.

We never leave the hospital without some major sweet pep in our step. We don’t take this job lightly and we know that these are moments you will never get back! Hire a photographer to capture them.

For any additional questions or if you are interested in booking, please contact us today, we’d love to chat!

XOXO,

Brittany & Whitney

Janna + Aaron | UF Engagement Session

We met up with Janna & Aaron a few months ago to capture their everything Gainesville-themed engagement session. Started in the SWAMP aka Ben Hill Griffin Stadium (Go Gators!) and took time around the beautiful campus. These two tailGATORS were precious and we LOVED the backwards hat in the back of her man’s pick-up truck photos! Then we moved onto ‘The Social’ where they first shared their first kiss, formerly known as ‘Gator City!’ We absolutely LOVE how these images turned out and we cannot wait to capture more pretty pictures and memories for them on October 20th of this year. . the Gators BYE week of course! ;) Janna & Aaron are getting married at Daughter’s Barn in Folkston, GA.

Enjoy a little Q+A as well as their love story through photographs.

How did you two meet?

“We met through walking down the aisle together at our friend Sam & Kaitlin’s wedding. ”

— Janna

When did you two meet?

“We met in January of 2014.”

— Janna

How long have y’all been together?

“Our first date was 3 years ago on October 4th! ”

— Janna

How did you know he was the one?

“I don’t think I really had one specific moment, but I just felt at home with him and I knew he was my person!”

— Janna

How did you know she was the one?

“I definitely knew when she met my parents and immediately clicked with my family. Five minutes into dinner, Janna was sharing two pitchers of margaritas and exchanging phone numbers with my Mom!”

— Aaron

When was the first kiss?

“Well. . . it was before our first date! Whoops! It was South Carolina weekend of 2014! We’d lost that game and went out to Gator City with Cassie and Drew as friends— Aaron kissed me in XS while we were all out together. It’s now where the Social is, so anytime we go there I always remind him!”

— Janna

How did he propose?

“Janna messed up those plans! I’d planned on proposing and surprising her at work, but Lena was born and she went down to meet her! I ended up proposing in her parent’s living room and her first response was, “are you kidding me?””

— Aaron

What is your favorite thing about each other?

“She’s changed a lot about me. She’s changed my house, and my outlook and she pushes me to be a better person inside and out. She’s also made me more family oriented.”

— Aaron

“He can always always make me laugh and helps calm my worrying that I tend to do often!”

— Janna

What are you most looking forward to at the wedding?

“Whiskey bar! Just kidding! The atmosphere at Daughter’s Barn and seeing a certain brunette in a white dress walking down the aisle!”

— Aaron

“The first look! He has guessed about my dress, but him seeing it for the first time gives me goosebumps thinking about it! I’m going to be ready to see my honey and become his Mrs!”

— Janna

“This was fun! We’ve been trying to take time and not just plan a wedding but a marriage and a future. So it was fun to answer these kind of questions!”

— Janna

Now you see why we absolutely ADORE this couple! The countdown is on for October 20th! See you guys in Folkston, GA so soon!

XOXO,

B+W

Sophia + Bo | St. Augustine Engagement Session

These two are a couple of Southern Studios favs! Brittany photographed their proposal last year and what a sweet story it was! Fast forward to their fast approaching wedding in August (next month! ahh!) a pretty engagement session in St. Augustine was a must! Sophia + Bo are getting hitched on August 11, 2018 at Crosswater Hall in Nocatee. Below, enjoy a little Q+A along with their so super sweet engagement photos. . .

How did you guys meet?

“Bo happened to see me at a TPC Sawgrass golf match. I was with four of my guy friends and he did not want to approach me because felt one of them would probably be my boyfriend.

A few days after the golf tournament, he happened to run across me on Facebook (people I may know, we had one friend in comment.) He sent me a friend request, and a week later on his birthday I accepted the request. That night he messaged me and said, “ I don’t want to come off weird, but I crossed paths with you a few weeks ago and thought you were beautiful and fun, and I wanted to possibly get to know you.” I thought he was really cute and he seemed super genuine. So he & I made small talk for a few days. But one day, he was tired of small talk! Bo had looked at my page and saw that I worked as an orthodontist assistant. He messaged me and said he was interested in adult braces. So I became chatty Kathy excited to help someone with braces. He stopped me half way through explaining his options and said, “I’ll be honest, I have already had braces and don’t need them but if coming in and getting them gets a date with you, sign me up!” I thought that was really cute so I gave him my number.”

— Sophia

How long have you guys been together?

“We’ve been together for 3 years and 2 months!”

— Sophia

How did you know he was the one?

“Knowing he was the one wasn’t like an ‘ah ha’ moment for me. I just knew I loved him and I loved the man he was. He brought so much to the table and made me a better person that I knew was meant for me.”

— Sophia

How did you know that she was the one?

“I called my friends on the way home from our first date and told them I knew I was going to marry this girl.”

— Bo

Tell us about the first date!

“Our first date was Wednesday, June 3rd, 2015. It was super fun and we talked a lot! It was such a good first date, that I asked him to a lunch date the next day. He was leaving for Poland that weekend for 3 weeks for Navy stuff, so I wanted to see him again before he left. While he was away, he & I talked the whole time! The rest is history and we have been together ever since.”

— Sophia

What is your favorite thing about Sophia?

“Sophia is the most loyal and forgiving person I have ever met.”

— Bo

What is your favorite thing about Bo?

“My favorite thing about Bo—he never stops making me laugh. No matter what is going on, he can always put a smile on my face.”

— Sophia

What are you both most looking forward to when anticipating the wedding?

“On the wedding day, we are both most looking forward to the first look. I cannot wait to see his reaction and he cannot wait to finally see me in the dress!”

— Sophia

We are so excited for you two & cannot wait to capture your wedding day! 

XOXO,

Brittany + Whitney

Brooke Tschorn | KHHS Senior C/O 2018

The McMillan Family | Family Portraits

Hayley Marie Shadd | Senior 2018

Introducing 2018 Lake Butler High School Senior, Hayley Elise Shadd! Hayley is so beautiful inside & out. She is extremely active at her school; She is a LB Cheerleader, FFA, BUSA, FBLA & TARS Member. She is currently attending Florida Gateway for general studies of her AA. but plans to transfer to University of Florida School of Dentistry upon graduation. Hayley your future is bright & we wish you the best in your future endeavors. We know you will accomplish BIG things! 

Maisyn Turns One! | One Year Old Birthday Session

Southern Studios loves capturing each and every milestone in life! This Snow White themed 1st birthday shoot is absolutely perfect! Her Mama put so much thought and detail into these pictures and it really made all the difference. We love the apples, the Snow White book, and even the little red bird on her shoulder. PLUS, those pretty in pink princess pictures! Alllll the heart eyes for Miss Maisyn! Happy 1st birthday, sweet girl! 

XOXO

A Year in Review | 2017

As 2017 comes to a close, we are reminiscing back on all the wonderful images we have had the pleasure and honor to photograph this year. The memories we've created through our cameras will truly last a lifetime & then some. We are so thankful and feel so blessed to be able to call this our dream job! From engagements to weddings, from maternity to birth stories, and everything else in between, we truly LOVE what we do.

Let us take a walk down memory lane. . . Here are our Top 20 Favorites from 2017: 

From the bottom of our hearts, THANK YOU! Cheers to 2018! 

XOXO,

Brittany + Whitney

The Blackburn Family | Fall Family Portrait Session

Best is yet to be! | Sunrise Wedding

Saturday, September 30th at 7am ShiAnn & JB said 'I Do' - this sunrise Kingsley Lake wedding was filled with love & laughter. Guests enjoyed a hot breakfast, served with mimosas & coffee. It was a beautiful day to celebrate Mr. & Mrs. Jonathan Best! It was an honor capturing your love story, we wish ya'll a lifetime of happiness! 

-B & W

Tate Ward | Birth Story

baby- (n) a little bit of Heaven sent down to earth. On July 13, 2017 at 9:04AM the Ward Family grew by two little feet. Tate Thomas Ward entered the world weighing 6lbs 12oz and 20.5" long. What a Blessing! Thank you for allowing Southern Studios to capture his Birth Story. Welcome to the Southern Studios Family, Tate

Hunter Clemons | Birth Story

At 5:50am on June 10, 2017 after 22hrs of labor, Hunter made his grand entrance into the world. A precious 7lbs 10oz & 19.5" gift from God to Kaylyn and Dillan Clemons 'For this child I have prayed and the Lord has granted the desires of my heart' | 1 Samuel 1:27 Thank you for including Southern Studios in this moment. Welcome to the world Hunter Eston Clemons & to the Southern Studios Family! -B & W

Sawyer Hinds | Birth Story

Every good & prefect gift is from above | James 1:17 June 8th, 2017 at 8:43am, God blessed Heather Hinds & Samuel Hinds with a beautiful healthy baby boy 9lbs 1oz & 21.75" long. "No one will ever know the strength of my love for you. After all you're the only one who knows what my heart sounds like from the inside." Thank you for allowing Southern Studios to capture this moment in time. Welcome to the world Sawyer!

Expecting Baby Coby Scott Coffey | Maternity

This sweet family is expecting another baby boy very soon! So excited for you all. Can't wait to meet Coby Scott! He will be the perfect little addition to your sweet family. Thank you for allowing Southern Studios the honor of photographing your maternity session! 

XOXO

Olivia | Southern Studios Seniors

Introducing Miss Olivia Archer | 2017 BHS Senior

Olivia, Southern Studios was honored to capture your Senior portraits! Thank you for spending your afternoon with us. From your outfits, hair & makeup, to your prop ideas, your creativity helped bring these photos to life! Thanks for also risking your life with me down in the creek! And yes, we RUN from snakes! These photos are gorgeous and we are in LOVE! Can't wait to see your Graduation announcements. Wishing you all the best in your future endeavors! Shoot for the stars and DREAM BIG! 

Jeremiah 29:11 "For I know the plans I have for you, declares the LORD, plans to prosper you and not to harm you, plans to give you a hope and a future." 

XOXO,

B+W

Expecting Baby Kainen || Maternity

Thankful this family braved the crazy Florida weather with me on this cold Sunday afternoon! Our first session together was when Alexis was pregnant with their oldest. I have loved photographing them over the years! Now I cannot wait to meet this newest little addition, Kainen. Wishing you all the best!

XOXO, Whitney